


Scar Tissue

by blcwriter



Category: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Academy Era, Childhood Trauma, Embedded Images, M/M, Originally Posted on LiveJournal
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-28
Updated: 2015-06-28
Packaged: 2018-04-06 16:14:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,535
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4228431
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blcwriter/pseuds/blcwriter





	Scar Tissue

Comment-fic for the following image posted by the awesome [](http://gadgetorious.livejournal.com/profile)[**gadgetorious**](http://gadgetorious.livejournal.com/)   for the Daily Captain and Doctor at [](http://jim-and-bones.livejournal.com/profile)[**jim_and_bones**](http://jim-and-bones.livejournal.com/) :

Academy fic, vague references to past!abused!Jim, schmoop, grouchy!profane!Bones. (Is there some other kind?)

\--

“No, dude, what _is_ that? A road rash? Dude, that shit is hideous.”

The what is he? Thirteen-years old? Curly-haired kid has clearly never heard of personal space much less the unspoken Man Rule, which is _never, ever_ comment on a man’s junk or his naked body.

Jim’s got his back to the kid, decontam chemicals mixing in with the blessed, blessed hot water streaming down over his muscled, pale white shoulders—the ones outlined by his necklace, the one everyone thinks is his dad’s dogtags or something, but is really a list of everything Jim’s deathly allergic to and that Leonard makes him wear over Jim’s vociferous protests.

“Whatever,” he’d said at the time. “I don’t trust some fucking quack not to shoot you up with the first thing that comes to hand without a med-alert on you somewhere,” since Jim was allergic to half the standard pharmacopeia.

The other kids—and that’s what they are-- standing behind Jim all pause and _look_ now that Mister Pre-Adolescent Nosy 2253’s gone and butted his nose in, and they’re all checking out the mess on Jim’s back, ass and thighs like it’s any damn business of theirs. It’s whitened with age, but people should mind their own fucking business. All these snot-nosed fucking kids—another fucking reminder of how the Academy hasn’t taught enough of them how to be men yet.

“Yeah, I was trying a stunt out and my bike went over on me,” Jim says, looking down and off to the side, never turning around. His voice is steady—even tinged with amusement-- if his hand holding the smelly yellow antibiotic soap they’re all supposed to be using after today’s sim accident is a more than little white-knuckled, none of them see it-- just Leonard, the only one facing Jim at the end of the row.

“Why didn’t you get that shit fixed, man?” Mr. Nosy continues, and well, fuck, Leonard’s not going to choke him, he’s not, he’s a doctor, he’s sworn not to do harm, even when the smile Jim pastes on his face and shoots over his shoulder is as brittle as glass, even if his voice is as bold and cocky as ever.

“Man, don’t you know? Chicks dig the scars.” The curly haired kid’s eyes widen as if Jim’s imparted some immortal wisdom, and his mouth opens like he’s going to ask even more questions. But Leonard, he’s had just enough.

“Enough yammering, you. Shut the fuck up and wash the fuck off. Those chemicals cause impotence and dick gangrene in men under 20 if you don’t wash them off,” Leonard finally barks, and that, _that_ gets the kid to shut the fuck up and mind his own goddamned business, him and the whole row of cadets behind the two of them all scrubbing furiously at their nuts like if they don’t do it now, their sacred and probably never-used cocks are going to fall off right there.

Serves the little shits right.

Jim doesn’t look at him as he finishes washing up, just does his thing, because as much as Leonard makes fun—okay, fine, mocks sometimes more than a little too hard—Jim _is_ a grown up, and doesn’t need to be reminded what to do when there’s been an exposure like happened today.

They finish washing in silence, and the rest of the cadets wander out as he and Leonard both finish up, then towel off.

It affords him a view, once again, of what _isn’t_ a road rash.

He doesn’t know who did it—or precisely when—because Jim won’t say except that “It’s past, and he’s dead,” and Leonard can tell when Jim’s lying to him and he’s not lying about that, nor was he lying when he said “Someday, Bones,” when Leonard asked him to tell him about the white lines and pockmarks and weals where someone took a switch and a whip and a belt and who knows what else to Jim’s body. But he knows Jim was little when it began, eight or ten—just a goddamned baby, godfuckingdamnit, because Leonard’s a pathologist, too, he can age fibrotic tissue with almost a glance, and he’s had more than a glance at this—shit isn’t even a word to describe it. Jim’s expression is utterly flat-faced and stoic—not a good thing at all.

The locker room’s empty, and they’re both dressed again in their reds, ready to head back out to the world—and he grabs Jim by the elbow and hauls him in for a kiss, worming his hand under Jim’s jacket, under his t-shirt, right over that “shit” that know-nothing brat had dared to call “hideous,” and holds him in place, hand splayed on Jim’s scarred, still shower-warm skin. His usual milk-musky smell is obscured by the chemical soap they’ve both used, and Leonard shoves down the urge to ask Jim to fuck him right here in the locker room until they’re both reeking of sex and their usual smells, both back to just them, both back to the place where Jim doesn’t have a false smile on his face and Leonard doesn’t have to protect the one man who protects him from everyone else and the stupid shit that they say because they can’t mind their own fucking business.

Sometimes, he really hates Starfleet. Except for the part where he met Jim.

“You’re fucking gorgeous,” he says finally, when he’s run out of air and has to stop kissing Jim because he’s a doctor and he knows he needs oxygen, damnit, he’s not a damned alien with adaptable lungs. “Gorgeous. You hear me? Those damned kids don’t know their ass from their elbow.”

Jim snorts and gives him a watery smile, which is a damned sight better than some false-cheer expression. “Damned kids on your lawn. Rah.”

Leonard gives the expected retort. “Uphill. Both ways. Etcetera.” Jim likes to call him “Old man” every time he starts complaining about the way Starfleet does shit half-assed, and it’s gotten so their banter’s devolved into shorthand, so much so that all of their friends just roll their eyes and Uhura calls them “Waldorf and Statler” after some old twentieth century TV show Leonard’s never seen but that delights Jim no end.

Jim leans his forehead against Leonard’s for just one moment longer, then leans in and kisses Leonard just once—shortly and chastely, almost, a real sign of how upset he—was, because his shoulders aren’t nearly so set with tension as they once were, and his back is uncoiled under Leonard’s splayed hand.

“Come on, old man,” he says, pulling back, but not so far that Leonard has to let go. “Let’s go be models for manners and decorum and manhood at Starfleet once more.” He puts on what he calls his “Serious Jim Kirk is Serious,” face, another reference Leonard doesn’t quite get but Jim thinks is absolutely hilarious, then gives Leonard a genuine, real, private smile, the kind most people don’t get to see.

Certainly not nosy snot-nosed adolescents, and may they _really_ get dick gangrene, and so help him, Leonard will stand by and let their cocks fall right off and laugh while it happens for making Jim hurt for even a second.

“Decorum. Right. You.” He pulls away, as much as he wishes he could stand there and kiss Jim all day, and they head out the door. “Because somebody didn’t paint the statue of the Federation founders pink, green and yellow last weekend just because they finished their astronavs paper early.”

As they enter the quad, Jim’s smile is as bright as the sun. “It was water-based paint, and it hosed right off, and I disabled the vid-cams, so they’re never going to know who it was. Plus, you totally helped.”

“I was drunk at the time.”

“That’s not an excuse, you’re always at least partially drunk, bourbon runs in your veins. And it was your idea to paint Archer’s crotch pink. Man, he was livid.”

Leonard can’t help the bark of laughter that erupts from his chest as he recalls how angry the old Admiral was—right before he’d started laughing, because they’d actually done a really good job and everyone’s features were finely outlined in the different colors.  Jim was a very good painter, turns out, and surgeons' hands are steady at multiple things.  It had even made the national news as the prank of the year and the campus was still all a-buzz because nobody had any clue who had managed the task.

Yeah. Those snot-nosed kids have a lot to learn and he and Jim are just the ones to show them.

He’s not often one for displays of affection—but today, well—he just is. He slings his arm over Jim’s shoulder and smiles as they walk past the now-restored statue.

“I’ll always help, kid.” He's not really sure how-- Jim's the bold one of them both, but so help him-- he means it.

 

 

 


End file.
